Exchange can't receive external emails

S

screwmesa

[H]ard|Gawd
Joined
May 19, 2005
Messages
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I have an exchange server (2003) set up. My firewall forward all port 25 traffic to the exchange server. My ISP has set up an MX record to forward all mail to the public ip of my exchange server. My firewall uses NAT to translate the public ip to its private address.

I can send email to anyone, but cannot receive email from external domains (ie yahoo or gmail or anyone but my my exchange users).

I've done nslookups and they all show an MX record pointing to the correct public IP of my server.

Help! :confused:

By the way, I can telnet the private ip from the lan, but not the public.
 
From the lan, it is doubtfull that you would be able to telnet to the public address. You will need to try connecting to the address from outside of your network. Try this and see how it goes.
 
I've got a guy going offsite to try to telnet into our server now...I'll let you know in a few minutes how it goes.
 
yes you need to try telnet to 25 from an external site. Also sounds like you are either missing or there may be a problem smtp connector. Is this a new install? You change the recipent policy...or add one for the external domain name?
 
Changed the recipient policy and it is a new install (which has yet receive external email)

If there were a problem with SMTP I would not be able to telnet and send a test message from the private ip, correct?
 
screwmesa said:
Changed the recipient policy and it is a new install (which has yet receive external email)

If there were a problem with SMTP I would not be able to telnet and send a test message from the private ip, correct?
Click to expand...

If the smtp was funtional, but not accessible from the internet, then you would still be able to send mail internally to the internet, but not the other way around. Are you using any cisco routers or firewalls between your mail server and the internet?

I remember a little tweak you used to have to do, because when you connected to the SMTP connector through the firewall, the firewall would garble the transmission and screw things up.

It was something obscure, like an alias to smtp on the firewall. You had to remove that and create the NAT translation using the port number instead of the name.
 
Ok, the telnet did not work from an external system. Nslookup gave the correct ip, but no connection could be established to the server's public ip.
 
Yes it was. I'm glad to report all is well in Exchange land. :D

Thanks everyone, beers on me! :eek:
 
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